My Bananas Aren't Ripe Yet

I need some help. I bought bananas earlier this week and today I need to make a banana cake and my bananas are still not "very ripe" Do any of you have a trick that will ripen bananas quickly? All yellow and not a very ripe one in the bunch....

I'd call the local grocery and see if they have an overripe ones. The blacker the peel, the better for banana cake. That's when they're really sweet! I wouldn't eat one that way, but it's the only way I bake with them.

I needed really ripe bananas once. I went to my local Thornton's (gas station/grocery store.) Those places always have really ripe bananas! Otherwise, the apple/brown bag works within 24 hours depending on how green they are.

Great suggestions, I was always wondering about this myself as every now and then all of the bananas at the store are green . Right, only when you need them ripe/overripe!

Now what I do is, every single time I have overripe bananas (even just one) I just throw them in the freezer. They freeze forever and are naturally wrapped against freezer burn. I have like 10 bananas in there right now, it will be a miracle if I ever make that much banana cake

I'm with you, ceshell! I volunteer at a food pantry every week and, when they're ready to dispose of the overripe bananas at the end of the night, I grab them and bring them home. I've taken a lot of teasing for it, and my freezer's full of bananas, but they really come in handy when I need them!!!

I too freeze my over ripe bananas. When I need to make a cake I pull them out of the freezer a couple of hours before I need them. My kids also love them straight out of the freezer into a blender with milk and icecream, makes a great smoothie.

Easy! I got it off the net. I use this recipe from Epicurious however I make the following modifications:1-I don't even bother with the orange butter2-I use only 1c flour3-I grind the 1/2c macadamia nuts as fine as possible in a food processor. They become that extra 1/2c flour that I just deleted. However I still fold them in at the end.4-Because there is less real flour I reduce the buttermilk to 1c5-Actually that's it! I don't add chopped macs at the end since I've already ground them up, however for extra punch I am sure you could add even more, lightly chopped.

I make a banana type pancake. I cut up some bananas and stick in on the griddle, then a little butter, little brown sugar, and sometimes a tiny bit of cinnamon. On top of all that I put some buttermilk pancake batter. It is so good.

glad to know I'm not the only one with a freezer full of black bananas!

Me too! I get my overages from my DD's preschool rather than letting them chuck 'em. Last time I got 10 HUGE bananas . So I made the teachers some apple-banana muffins

Anyway thanks for all of the ripening info. I may have a freezerful of black bananas, but that doesn't help when you just want to eat a piece of fresh fruit. I had no idea about using apples to speed up the process. This will come in super-handy for avocados too.